Women's Views on News |
| Women still in lower-paid work Posted: 01 Oct 2013 08:05 AM PDT
This is despite the fact that 67 per cent of women are now in work, compared to 53 per cent in 1971. The proportion of men in work over the same period has decreased from 92 per cent to 76 per cent. The Office for National Statistics (ONS), who analysed the figures believes these varying employment rates are explained by the decline of manufacturing and increased demand in the service sector. However, this is also perhaps why women are concentrated in traditionally low-paid professions. According to the Office for National Statistics, 82 per cent of employees in caring, leisure and other services are female, as well as 77 per cent of workers in administrative and secretarial work. Furthermore, in 2013 men accounted for 37 per cent of upper-middle skilled roles while women only made up 18 per cent. Reflecting on these statistics, John Philpott, from the consultancy The Jobs Economist, told the Guardian: "While the UK jobs market has become much more feminised in the past four decades, with the employment rate gap between men and women narrowing markedly, judged by the types of work we do women have made far less progress. "The persistence of gendered job roles leaves women at a relative disadvantage in the labour market." There are also gendered discrepancies within professional occupations. Despite more women belonging to this category than men, 21 per cent and 19 per cent respectively, women are more likely to be in lower-paid jobs. Nursing, the most common job for professional women, pays an average of £16.61 per hour whereas programming and software development, the most common area of work for professional men, pays over £20. According to the Guardian, Frances O'Grady, General Secretary of the Trades Union Congress, said: "All too often the jobs in the sectors where women tend to work, such as the care sector, are underpaid and undervalued. "We've come a long way but sex discrimination, unaffordable childcare, a lack of quality part-time work and the undervaluing of women's work still cast a shadow over our labour market.” The Office for National Statistics also found that above the age of 22 men have consistently higher employment rates than women. The gap increases for parents as, statistically, having a child makes a man more likely to be employed and a woman less likely. Susan Himmelweit, Professor of Economics at the Open University, believes this is the source of a never ending problem. She told the Independent: "So long as you have a gender pay gap – and these figures show you certainly do – it's going to be the case that, if you're in a couple and you're only going to have one worker, it makes more sense for it to be the man in employment." Daisy Sands, Policy Manager at the Fawcett Society, agreeD, believing that women pay a severe penalty for becoming mothers. "Women in the UK still tend to do the lion's share of childcare," she said. "Add to this the lack of flexible working opportunities and prohibitively expensive childcare, and we face a situation where, for women, work all too often doesn't pay. "This 'motherhood penalty' is most keenly illustrated in the nation's capital – Londoners face the highest costs for childcare in the country and therefore some of the most expensive in Europe." “While highlighting the strides women have made in the workforce over the last 50 years,” she said, “[this] report serves as a timely reminder of how far we have to go before we have a women friendly labour market.”  |
| Saving maternal and infant lives Posted: 01 Oct 2013 04:08 AM PDT
By Judy Manning and Zeda Rosenberg; a repost from Policy Innovations. The picture could not be clearer: A woman’s health and livelihood are threatened when modern family planning methods are out of her reach. On World Contraception Day, September 26, we are reminded that unintended pregnancy is a major contributor to maternal and infant death and disability around the world, and a recognized obstacle to global development. Forty percent of pregnancies worldwide are unintended, but that number is not so surprising when you consider that 222 million women have an unmet need for modern contraceptive methods. Access to such methods would enable women to plan and space their pregnancies, leading to improved health, educational, and economic outcomes for themselves and their families. According to the Guttmacher Institute, 70 percent of the unmet need stems from method-related concerns. These include concerns about the safety and potential side effects of hormonal methods; appropriate options for women who have infrequent sex, or who are postpartum or breastfeeding; and opposition from their partners to specific approaches. Geography and access to health services are also barriers to modern contraception. Last year at the London Summit on Family Planning, the global community made an unprecedented pledge to reach 120 million more women with contraception by 2020. The upcoming International Conference on Family Planning in Ethiopia will map out additional steps required to make contraception available for all women. Efforts will focus on expanding access to existing methods as well as prioritizing the development of new innovative technologies. New sexual and reproductive health innovations have the potential to revolutionize women’s options by diversifying delivery forms, varying product duration, and targeting multiple health risks simultaneously. Unfortunately, there is no magic bullet. When it comes to sexual and reproductive health, women face obstacles that are unique to their circumstances. But experience has taught us that if women have a range of affordable and appropriate products to pick from, they may use them more consistently, which in turn will allow them to better protect their health. We are excited about a number of cutting-edge technologies now in development. For instance, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) is investing in the early-stage development of a biodegradable contraceptive implant that does not require removal. This product from FHI 360 could fill a critical gap in low-resource settings where women may not have access to trained health workers. Alongside contraceptive-only products, multipurpose prevention technologies (MPTs) can help address women’s overlapping health needs in a single product. For example, women in areas with high rates of HIV often have the greatest unmet need for family planning, creating a double burden of risk. With support from USAID and other funders, the International Partnership for Microbicides (IPM) is developing a 60-day MPT ring to offer dual protection against HIV and unintended pregnancy that women could use discreetly. The self-initiated ring is being designed to provide sustained release of an antiretroviral (ARV) drug called dapivirine along with the contraceptive hormone levonorgestrel. USAID and other funders also recognize that, in many regions of the world, sexually transmitted infections (STIs) such as herpes simplex virus, human papillomavirus, and bacterial vaginosis are of greater public health concern than HIV. As a result, USAID is supporting CONRAD to develop an MPT that combines the new one-size-fits-most SILCS diaphragm with tenofovir gel—the first ARV drug shown to help prevent both HIV and herpes (a confirmatory trial of tenofovir’s effectiveness is under way). This would provide women with a non-hormonal product that could be used “on demand,” appealing to women who would like a product that is used at the time of sex. MPTs could result in significant health gains for women by broadly addressing their sexual and reproductive health needs, and reducing rates of maternal and newborn death associated with both unintended pregnancy as well as STIs. In fact, there is reason to believe that MPTs may have another added benefit: Combining two or more products into one may make protection more appealing and acceptable to women, and therefore increase its use. To fully realize the immense promise of up-and-coming innovations, we need continued investment in the development pipeline, and in full access to the final products. No single product will address every woman’s sexual and reproductive health needs, so it will take a portfolio of methods to ensure that women have options to choose from that are appropriate for their individual circumstances. New tools are not developed overnight—they take time, effort, and dedicated resources. But it is an investment that will help make modern contraception a reality for the millions of women whose lives and well-being depend on it. This article first appeared in Policy Innovations on 26 September 2013 and is reproduced here under Creative Commons License. Judy Manning is Health Development Officer, Office of Population and Reproductive Health with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID); Zeda Rosenberg is Chief Executive Officer at International Partnership for Microbicides and an expert in HIV prevention research.  |
| ‘Hard-fought freedoms attacked’ Posted: 01 Oct 2013 01:09 AM PDT
Last weekend large area of Parliament Square in London was covered by white flowers to represent the more than 10,000 people who have died shortly after undergoing Work Capability Assessment, the degrading test used by the government to assess the needs of people receiving benefits related to disability and ill health. Disabled activists and supporters went to Parliament Square on 28 September for ’10,000 Cuts & Counting’, a ceremony of remembrance and solidarity for over 10,000 who died shortly after the degrading Work Capability Assessments (WCA) run for the government by Atos Origin. The ceremony, in the square bounded by the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey, the Supreme Court and the Treasury was organised by the 10,000 Cuts & Counting Campaign including disability activists, Occupy activists and the Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral. As well as many testimonies, there was 2 minutes of silent remembrance for those who have suffered and died. Four prayers were said, facing the four sides of the square: towards Westminster Abbey for the families of those who have suffered and disabled people still suffering or despairing; facing the Supreme Court calling for justice and compassion for those without resources and power and for an end to discrimination and violence against the disabled; towards the Treasury calling on those in national and local government who decide on the use of resources to take into account the effect on people of what they do; and finally towards Parliament, calling for a new deal for disabled people and to put right the evident wrongs in the current system. On the same day, fifty thousand people marched on the @Conservatives at conference in Manchester yesterday in defence of public services 'under attack' from David Cameron's government. Manchester city centre became a sea of colour as protesters arrived and marched and sent a clear message to the prime minister to scrap spending cuts and drop #NHS reforms. Blistering sunshine made for a carnival atmosphere as the march made its way past the conference centre and to a rally in Whitworth Park. The Greater Manchester Police (GMP) estimating that more than 50,000 turned up – at least 10,000 more than organisers expected. The GMP said that the protest – perhaps the largest ever dealt with by the force – had passed off peacefully in the most part, with just two arrests for breaches of the peace. And next weekend, on 5 October, UK Uncut will be blocking roads in 6 cities in the UK; Cambridge, Hull, London, Northampton, Norwich and Manchester. The idea is to fight back against the Government’s dangerous changes to legal aid that will destroy democracy and ordinary people's lives. Why block a road? Blocking roads and taking space, says UKUncut, have long histories in protest movements from peace activism to anti-imperialism, from calls for civil rights to trade union demands for workers rights. These moments of appropriation are a deliberate means of challenging injustice and to call for an extension of rights: calls for power to be distributed in a more equal fashion. In the summer of 1981 a small group of women marched from Cardiff to the US airforce base in Greenham Common. They walked for nine days to protest at the locating of US cruise missiles there. Those women began what was to become one of the biggest acts of civil resistance ever to occur in the UK. The women stood together to block roads and to transform the space around the base in an act of defiance that would last for over twenty years. These women physically blocked roads, their bodies were peaceful symbols against the violence contained within the base. UKUncut says it is blocking the roads to challenge the #Conservatives and Liberal Democrats’ authority to rip away our rights. With changes to legal aid and the proposed shifts in judicial reviews our equality before the law is being taken away – and our ability to hold our government to account is threatened. The blockades before were about demanding new rights – from winning the vote to civil rights. This time we will challenge our government's authority to rip away our rights. Are you willing to stand by and have your rights taken under the ideological banner of economic cuts? This isn’t about money, it’s about division, untruth and injustice. It’s about centuries worth of hard fought freedoms being attacked. Soaring over the Old Bailey, Lady Justice stands – supposedly an impartial guardian. Inscribed beneath her, UKUncut point out, are the words 'defend the children of the poor and punish the wrongdoer'. UKUncut is asking people to join them on 5 October to protect those rights – to tell the government that they have no mandate to block our access to justice. To stand together and say no to the cruelty of taking away the rights of the most vulnerable in society and to say yes to equality before the law. Details on the UKUncut facebook page.  |
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